Effect of Ta doping on the characteristic features of spray-coated SnO2

• SnO2:Ta thin films were deposited via spray pyrolysis.
• The effect of Ta contribution on properties of SnO2 was investigated.
• Ta doping highly altered properties of SnO2.
• The deposited films can be used in a variety of applications.

In present work, undoped and Ta-doped SnO2 thin films were fabricated via a simple and cheap spray pyrolysis technique. The Ta-doping level was varied from 0 at.% to 5 at.% in the step of 1 at.%. Large pyramidal and small densely-packed tetragonal SnO2 particles were observed by X-ray diffraction and scanning electron microscope. Atomic force microscope analysis indicated that root mean square roughness values of films changed from 26.7 nm to 51.6 nm with Ta-doping. The electrical and optical measurements revealed that the films had a degenerate n-type semiconductor property. The resistivity, sheet resistance, carrier concentration, mobility, and optical band gap values of films varied between 1.11 × 10− 2 Ω cm–2.35 × 10− 3 Ω cm, 130.66 Ω/□–26.97 Ω/□, 2.72 × 1019 cm− 3–1.12 × 1020 cm− 3, 20.68 cm2 V− 1 s− 1–30.78 cm2 V− 1 s− 1, and 3.43 eV–3.94 eV, respectively. As a result of this study, it is concluded that characteristic properties of SnO2 can be greatly improved with Ta-doping.